Snow White's Got Nothing on Me

Sometimes, I feel like I am on a secret medical show.  I don't realize I'm on it, but everyone else is in on the gag.

"What crazy crap can we diagnosis Kristi with next?"

Let's count just the top ten odd medical things that have happened in my life...

1.  I've  already told you about the time I ruptured my ear drum with a Q-tip.  Yes, it can happen. Yes, it hurts like hell.

2.  In the same post, I gave you the lowdown on my finger getting caught in a bowling ball and rupturing all the tendons.  Because, of course, getting your finger stuck in the ball *always* happens to people who aren't in cartoons.

3.  Then, there's the day my large intestine decided to vacate my body.  That was a fun, fun day.

4. Oh, and the time my ovary tried to kill me by exploding.  Seriously.  Exploding....like an organ bomb. An. Organ.  Bomb.   Just think about that.

5.  And, of course, because of the same bitchy ovary, I got peritonitis from it and swelled up like a nine month pregnant woman because of all the infection coursing through my internal organs.   That was a jolly good 8 days in the hospital.

6.  Once while playing basketball, I came down on my ankle wrong, and tore the tendons in it.... badly enough that you could pull my foot away from my leg like a drawer out of a dresser.    Now THAT felt
ah-mazing, I'm here to tell you.

7. When I was a senior, I got mono.   That's normal enough.  Until I developed mono hepatitis and my liver swelled up like a third boob on my abdomen, and my spleen, not wanting to be left out, decided it didn't want to work anymore either and became grumpy and inflamed.   I had a note from the doctor saying I couldn't wear a seat belt, because if my mom slammed on the brakes, my liver would lacerate, and I would bleed  to death before I made it to the hospital.  Eventually I was sick enough that they told mom to take me home and make me comfortable.  I'd get better or I wouldn't.  Hooray, HMOs and crappy insurance in the 80s.

8.  A couple of years ago, I got a lovely case of Dog Whooping Cough.   Yep, Bordatello.   Kennel Cough.   That was me.   The whole school had to be cleaned because kids get whooping cough booster shots in the seventh grade, and guess who teaches seventh grade?  Yep, that's right.  This gal.

9. After major surgery, I developed a raging case of C. diff.,  a scary antibiotic resistant superbug which makes you so sick with vile, foul-smelling uncontrollable diarrhea and vomiting that you can't keep down water.  I spent almost three weeks in the hospital.   At my worst, I was losing a pound a day.  Everything made me nauseous.   The only upside was I developed a crazy, grizzly bear-like smelling ability.  I could actually smell the medicine they used to flush my IV.  I could smell what people had eaten hours before.  I could pick out their lotion or body wash or hair spray.    Sounds awesome, but the smell of EVERYTHING, even my own shampoo, made me throw up. If you ever get a choice in a superpower, this is NOT the one to pick.   They brought me  a chemo nurse who didn't wear perfume or lotion.  I also received a lovely PICC line which delivered this thick, IV goop directly into my heart, so I wouldn't die.   Two of the best gifts I've ever received.

*sigh*  Memory Lane.    Good.  Times.

Then there's our latest installment of weird crap that Kristi gets and should make her her own reality show.....

I got sun poisoning.

Yep, you can be poisoned by the sun.  Who knew?

Apparently, according to the doctor, "normal" people (his word, not mine)   blister outward with a sunburn.  Sometimes, people blister in and so there ya go.

I was outside for three hours on a Saturday.  Three hours.  That's it.  I didn't have sunscreen on, because really, it was three hours.   Who burns that quickly?

This girl on that day, apparently.

The sunburn started normally enough.   That night I started getting red....and then redder...and then redder.

I thought it was weird, but I am the color of an Irish albino ghost normally, so I just thought I DEFINITELY needed to get out into the sun a *wee* bit more this summer.

Sunday morning, I woke up and my forehead looked like this.

Okay.. maybe not *just* like that, but my forehead swelled up so much it jiggled  like jello when I walked, and stuck out like someone had stuffed a turtle under my skin while I slept.  

Crazy weirdness.

I didn't feel well that day as I battled a headache, but we went grocery shopping, because apparently, despite how I am feeling, people in my house think they still  need to eat.

As we wandered the aisles of Kroger and my forehead shimmered like some desert mirage, a young mom looked me straight in the eye, watched my forehead wiggle, and said, "Oh!! That reminds me!!  We need aloe vera!"

Yeah... me too.

I posted something on Facebook about my crazy sunburn and a gazillion and four homemade remedies came in.  

I tried vinegar and brown paper sacks. Nothing.  I tried Noxema (which actually felt flippin' amazing and gets my vote).   I did the aloe thing.  Nothing.

Something  I did took the sting out, however the forehead just kept swelling and swelling, though.  Monday was Memorial Day, so I didn't have to go to work.  That was excellent because my headache was now worse.   I just hung out on the couch and moaned all day.  Tuesday, I went to work.  One of my friends, who had seen the pictures I'd put on Facebook,  stopped by my classroom and said, "Wow.  My daughter had sun poisoning one time, and you look just like her, but her swelling went all down into her eyes.  You're lucky."  

From her mouth to the angry Coppertone god's ears.

Within an hour, I started having difficulty blinking.  When I went to the bathroom I was shocked to see that my entire eye looked like someone had punched me.  The swelling was moving down.

I called urgent care and went in.   The doctor informed me I had sun poisoning.  I didn't understand how it was possible.  I've been outside plenty of times.  This has never happened before. Was it something I did or didn't do it?  He explained that sometimes, we just take on more UV than we should, but doctors don't know why.   Even if I had worn sunscreen that day, this may have happened... just to a lesser degree.   He gave me a steroid shot, told me to drink lots of water,  and said that I life would be great in a day or two.  

He lied.

Oh, how he lied.

The next day I was worse.  My headache was a full-on migraine.  One of my eyes had bruised beneath and both eyes were attempting to swell shut.  My left side of my face was numb and funny feeling, and occasionally, when I would speak, I would make this funky pfffft noise like a horse farting. My mouth and eye on the same side started drooping slightly.  I was drooling a little, and my left eye wouldn't quit watering.

It was mucho sexy-o.

Hmmmmm. mmmm..

The good news was the sunburn was gone almost completely gone, and I was this beautiful brown color.

Back to the doctor I went.  My real doctor this time.   He was not pleased with my symptoms.  Apparently, my face had swollen up enough that it was pressing on a nerve and causing Bell's Palsy.   It wasn't a full on attack yet.... the swelling was just irritating the nerve.    If I laid down and didn't get up for the next three days while the steroids worked their hoo-doo magic, life should be good and the palsy would  go away.     If I didn't let gravity do its job, the attack would be full-on, get worse, and it would be anyone's guess as to when it went away.

I was forbidden from going to work the rest of the week.

Now let's, recap shall we?  Three hours in the sun. Sunburn.  Sun poisoning.  Bell's palsy.

What.   The.  HECK.

How many of you have worked in the yard,  wandered around at a flea market,  gone to garage sales, and not put on sunscreen?   Who would have thought three hours in the sun would make me look like Quasimodo on steroids?   Literally?

The moral of the story is this.  From now on, I will wear sunscreen.   And a floppy hat.    And sunglasses.  Long sleeves and jeans, if need be.

Who cares if I'm the color of milk?